Increasingly, psychiatrists make little distinction between psychiatric and neurologic disorders, considering them all as dysfunctions of the central nervous system. This is a practical how to book intended primarily for trainees and practicing clinicians unfamiliar with the relatively new field of neuropsychiatry. It is written as the author might teach the material during clinical rounds and in small group seminars. In a clear and engaging style, he explains what to do and how to do it, giving the rationale for each step, and synthesizing neuropsychiatric principles with practical...

This book provides a comprehensive review of melancholia as a severe disorder of mood, associated with suicide, psychosis, and catatonia. The syndrome is defined with a clear diagnosis, prognosis, and range of management strategies, differentiated from other similar psychiatric, neurological, and general medical conditions. It challenges accepted doctrines in the classification and biology of the mood disorders and defines melancholia as a treatable mental illness. Described for millennia in medical texts and used as a term in literature and poetry, melancholia was included within early...

This book provides a comprehensive review of melancholia as a severe disorder of mood, associated with suicide, psychosis, and catatonia. The syndrome is defined with a clear diagnosis, prognosis, and range of management strategies, differentiated from other similar psychiatric, neurological, and general medical conditions. It challenges accepted doctrines in the classification and biology of the mood disorders and defines melancholia as a treatable mental illness. Described for millennia in medical texts and used as a term in literature and poetry, melancholia was included within early...

There are almost as many explanations for psychiatric disorders as there are patients with them. Each explanation is intriguing, some of them are systematic, all of them have intellectually powerful champions. Yet their very multitude is a scandal. It provokes the professionally debilitating challenge: Why does every psychiatric explanation satisfy some people and not others? Recently this question has received a simple answer. We cannot satisfactorily explain that which we lack the skill to describe. To develop the fundamental skill a student must see many patients under the direction of an...